Love in Action Movie Trailer

Posted on December 5, 2011 by Jacob Flores

Director Morgan Jon Fox is set to release a documentary titled Love in Action in March 2012. This movie follows the life of a young gay man sent to Love In Action, a Christian based ex-gay therapy “ministry.”

The parents’ decision to send their son off to be brainwashed (rightfully) sparks controversy in their town.

You may remember Love in Action (the ex-gay group, not the movie) from a previous post on John Smid, former director of Love in Action, who recently came out of the closet himself. Smid appears in the documentary spouting his support for ex-gay conversion. The fact that he is now out and proud adds validity to the film maker’s vision.

Here’s the trailer for the movie. I know I plan on watching it when it is released.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcNlOYbA8p8

(video via Joe.My.God)

Another Ex-Gay Leader Comes Out

Posted on November 3, 2011 by Jacob Flores

Sergio Viula, who lives in Brazil and who helped found the ex-gay conversion group Movement for the Healthy Sexuality (or MOSES), came out of the closet.

According to The Flying Teapot, MOSES is an “evangelical NGO which helps people interested in quitting homosexuality.” Because of the ex-gay conversion, Viula “got married, had two children and saw by himself the very methods of ‘sexual re-orientation.'”

Surprisingly, the “brainwashing” didn’t stick. Not that anyone is really surprised.

In an interview shared by ThinkProgress, Viula stated “Nobody really quit being gay. There were relationships even within the group, between an activity and another, they would always find time for that.”

Apparently while the gays were being converted by MOSES into heterosexuality, they were heading back to their rooms to do the nasty with people of the same sex.

Viula isn’t the first ex-gay to come out of the closet. I posted awhile back about John Smid, another ex-gay leader who admitted that conversion therapy was a fraud.

Now, Viula’s voice joins Smid’s in their attempts to undo the damage they have done, but I have to wonder: is that enough?

How many years did both men torment other homosexuals in their attempts at making them straight? How much mental anguish did they inflict on others, promising that the “conversions” were valid?

Is simply apologizing and trying to clear the air enough?

For me, it is not. While I’m glad these men have accepted who they truly are, it doesn’t undo the damage they have already inflicted.

A criminal may be sorry for his crimes, but that doesn’t solely exonerate him. It seems to me that Viula, Smid, and others like them should have to suffer some type of legal recourse for their actions.

Ex-Gay Minister Admits He’s Gay!

Posted on October 11, 2011 by Jacob Flores

ThinkProgress reports that John Smid, founder and former director of Love in Action (LIA), one of the oldest ex-gay conversion ministries, has come out of the closet.

Since Smid’s resignation from LIA in 2008, he apparently has had a change of heart about his own sexuality (he’s gay and married to a woman) and his beliefs on homosexuality in general. (I would guess so, now that he “realizes” he’s one of us!) Click here to read his latest blog post.

Smid’s revelations have led him to understand how narrow minded his previous views on homosexuality were. He even admitted the following:

“I was completely unwilling to hear anything that didn’t fit my paradigm. I blocked out anyone’s life story or biblical teaching that didn’t match up with what I believed… Now that I am not submerged into one sided perspectives, I am open to studying and reading the scriptures for myself, I am finding so many rich truths that I wasn’t ever made aware of before.

To me, this admission proves that proponents of conversion therapy know logically that ex-gay conversion doesn’t work, but since the facts contradict prejudice-based ignorance, they choose to ignore it like presidential hopefuls Rick Santorum and Herman Cain. The science is there, but people like Santorum and Cain (and at one time Smid) refuse to look at the data because it doesn’t support the hate they spout.

Now that Smid is free from such hateful clutter, he sees the word of God in a new light. He understands that the Bible is about love and acceptance, not about fostering hate and fear.

He even now realizes that “One cannot repent of something that is unchangeable…. the transformation for the vast majority of homosexuals will not include a change of sexual orientation. Actually I’ve never met a man who experienced a change from homosexual to heterosexual.”

It’s nice to hear an ex-gay minister say those words. The mere idea is preposterous. If homosexuals could change to being heterosexual, then that means heterosexuals can do the same thing. How many of my heterosexual friends believe they could be persuaded by prayer to be gay? Yeah, that’s what I thought. You can’t wish (or pray) the gay away or into someone. That’s now how it works.

Luckily, Smid also realizes that too. “I used to define homosexuality or heterosexuality in terms describing one’s behavior,” he confessed. “I thought it made sense and through the years often wrote articles and talked from that perspective. Today, I understand why the gay community had such an issue with my writings. My perspective denied so many facets of the homosexual experience. I minimized a person’s life to just their sexuality but homosexuality is much more than sex.”

Precisely. Just as sex is only a small part of a heterosexual person’s identity, sex isn’t the entire portion of a homosexual’s identity either. We are all so much more than who we go to bed with at night. I’m glad Smid finally realizes that and has been enlightened. I applaud him for not only making the change but admitting it.

It takes a lot of strength to admit you have been behaving badly, and I applaud Smid for not only eating crow but for now being a voice for truth.

Rick Santorum Supports Reinstating DADT & Ex-Gay Therapy

Posted on October 9, 2011 by Jacob Flores

Republican Presidential hopeful Rick Santorum once again proved today how un-electable he is.

During an interview this morning on FOX news, Santorum regurgitated his support for the reinstatement of DADT, which he expressed during the GOP debate where a soldier was booed. (Click here to read that post).

Santorum believes that if gays are allowed to serve openly in the military then our “recruitment and retention” will decrease. He makes these claims despite the reports that the majority of service members have no issue working alongside homosexual soldiers. Once again, a candidate chooses to ignore the facts and instead pushes an agenda fueled by hate and prejudice. Most soldiers don’t care who sleeps with who anymore than most people care who their colleague sleeps with at home. Everyone’s private life is just that–private. The government needs to stop caring what happens in the privacy of an individual’s home and refrain from making laws, which attempt to govern any individual’s pursuit of personal happiness.

To add insult to injury, however, Santorum’s rhetoric is strikingly similar to the arguments used in the 1940’s when racial integration became a problem for the military. Candidates against integration worried about “close sleeping quarters” and “showers” just as Santorum does. Homosexuality isn’t a communicable disease anymore than being Black is. If that was the case, I’d be sneezing all over everyone in Washington! Then, those conservative politicians would not only be gay but Latino too! (I bet they’d really hate that!)

Still, Santorum’s frothing at the mouth knows no bounds! For Santorum, homosexuality is a choice, despite the many psychological studies conducted to combat this belief. (Once again, science and cold hard data mean little when faced with ignorance). To make matters worse, Santorum supports ex-gay therapy saying that “There are all sorts of studies out there that suggest just the contrary, and there are people who were gay and lived the gay lifestyle and aren’t anymore. I don’t think that’s the case with anyone who’s black.”

Apparently, Santorum forgets there was a time when Blacks used to bleach their skin to try and blend in. The hate they felt from the nation drove those American citizens to feel as if they had to change their skin color something that is really unalterable in order to fit in. As ridiculous as trying to lighten one’s skin tone seems to be now, that is the same nonsense ex-gay conversion spouts.

Ex-gay conversion doesn’t work, according to the APA, but once again, who cares about the facts, when an argument is based on hate, fear, and ignorance? All of those are a wonderful platform for a presidential candidacy, aren’t they?